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Topic: How do you guys use Syns? (Read 978 times)

I recently got a damaged syn in the loot from one of those orbital freighter missions. Those missions are brutal! Lost a few gals and everyone else came back wounded. Lots of fighting in those grav lift shafts. Anyway, once I did all the research and rebuilt her, I find I'm having trouble finding the best way to use her.

The high TU, energy, and good resistances made me think melee, but the poor energy recovery and lack of inventory space for recovery consumables made me think twice. Same problem for a dedicated thrower/bow gal. Currently I'm using her a high mobility sniper, so she only needs to move a handful of times, then can sit and snipe while the energy recovers. It works well, but I don't think it's really using her to her fullest.

They are best in melee. Your energy reserve should last you a few turns, more than enough to contribute plenty of kills/stuns. If you are worried about running out too soon, you can use chiller outfit.

At least initially syns have stamina issues, mostly because of the stamina above 300(?) or you take stun mechanics. Equip one with a chiller suit to start so its less of an issue, they are plenty sturdy even in comparatively light armor, and the bonus to stamina and stamina regen they receive in the outfit is far more valuable. Once they have some stamina gains you can upgrade the armor.

They do best as short range assault units, the claw attack they have on some outfits is exceptionally powerful for an inbuilt weapon. Beyond that short range highpower weapons like slugthrowers and boom guns.

The key to managing a syn's stamina is to 1) limit sprinting to a bare minimum. 2) Don't be afraid to leave the syn exposed to attack. Most small weapons like pistols and rifles cant hurt them due to there excellent resistances+moderate armor. You dont need to get out of LoS of most foes.

Like said, run them with chiller for a while until they build up their stamina. Then give them the jugulator and your best melee weapon and watch them effortlessly wreck anything and everything without taking any damage.

Forget about stamina management. These are cruise missiles. You point them at the enemy and fire them off with maximal speed. A full powered syn can slice and dice a dozen enemies in a turn. In my playthrough I have 2 maxed out syns - by the time they run out of energy most of the enemies tend to be dead. Your main challenge as a player is to figure out how to not become bored with your campaign. I started house-ruling myself to only let the syns out of the dropship if it's a really dire battle or limit them to just a few kills.

Nothing new to add here, just agreeing with the above posts. Early on shove them in a chiller suit, once their stats get up there you can sprint around the battlefield chopping things into little bits. I usually put some kind of pistol in the QD slot just in case, but mostly they murder stuff with melee weapons.

I'll just point out one additional weapon for them - Kustom blunderbuss with gold (bling) ammo. It's damage scales off TU's, so it gets pretty good for experienced syns. Worse dmg than boom gun (even with max TU), but faster to fire and with auto-capability. Overall worse than Super shotgun, but it's accessible earlier (and no MCWP required). Unfortunately, the ammo is pretty expensive.

Syns are also fairly powerful with thrown weapons, since most of them have a fixed TU cost. It's possible to throw 2 sets of sunblades in a turn, for 50-60 base dmg each (theoretically up to 81dmg @ max THR). Ring-dang-doo is also pretty good for them (if you managed to get it). Syns lack the equipment slots (esp. backpack) for prolonged throwing battles, though.

Thanks for the advice everyone. Sounds like I've been worrying too much over the low stam regen and small health pool. She's been doing the sniper thing for a while, so I think her stamina is fine. I'll try her with melee, and be a bit more reckless. I like the kustom blunderbuss idea too. I've got a couple collecting dust at the moment, so why not?